We've got a house!

The Independent has a lovely article on Mrs Gaskell's Manchester House on 84 Plymouth Grove. If you haven't recently heard about the place, you shouldn't worry. The Town Council of Manchester City have been happily (?) letting it rot on the basis that

"The house belonged to one of the ugliest periods of architecture and was of no value beyond its association with the Gaskell family."

Honestly - by that picture do you think it's an ugly place? Goodness knows what these people would have made of the Haworth Parsonage!

We also found this other gem:

A potential backer, after being shown around, remarked: "She's not exactly Catherine Cookson, is she?"

But things are looking up. People are starting to see sense:

The Manchester Historic Buildings Trust acquired the house in 2004, and the long road to restoration was embarked upon. [...]

There is much work to be done. Structural cracks run through the walls, the foundations have to be underpinned, the whole roof replaced and dry rot eradicated, while the entire building must be restored and upgraded. Leaks from the roof this winter have added to the repair bill, to which, it is hoped, the Heritage Lottery Fund will donate £1m. English Heritage has offered funding, and altogether £400,000 has been promised from various sources.

The restoration may recreate three different eras: the original late Georgian phase; the High Victorian typical of Mrs Gaskell's 15-year occupation; and a Late Victorian decoration of 1890. The plan is to open the principal rooms on the ground floor to the public as a museum containing pieces of Gaskell's furniture, as a study centre and as a space for readings and performances.

The Heritage Lottery Fund has stipulated that part of the house should be set aside for community use: after-school clubs, literacy classes and so on. While this ruling may be seen by some purists as a departure from creating a Gaskell memorial, nevertheless it can be seen as being in the spirit of her own philanthropic outlook. "I am sure she would have approved of the house being put to public use," said the Gaskell scholar Alan Shelston.

We humbly agree with Mr Shelston. If anything, Mrs Gaskell was an extremely philanthropic soul. She bought the house in 1850 and she wrote:

We've got a house! ... And if I had neither conscience nor prudence I should be delighted, for it certainly is a beauty... You must come and see it and make me see... that it is right to spend so much ourselves on so purely a selfish thing as a house is, while so many are wanting - that's the haunting thought for me.

That implies she would have hated to see her home rotting to the bone, even though by the time she died she had just bought a new house on the outskirts as a surprise to her husband. However, she never got to live there.

At any rate, this endearing and optimistic article has one anecdote that makes it even more endearing:

Gaskell was also a close friend (and the first biographer) of Charlotte Brontë, who stayed at the house three times. On one occasion she was too shy to greet the Gaskells' friends, so she hid behind the large curtains in the drawing room.

Awww, isn't that like Charlotte? :)

We'd like to take this opportunity to encourage one and all to pick up Mrs Gaskell's works. They might not be well-known but they deserve it because she was one great writer and story-teller, a charming woman.

The Trust, The Gaskell Society, Friends of Plymouth Grove and Manchester City Council are all backing the project, alongside English Heritage. "We hope that we are now on our way," said Janet Allan, the chair of Manchester Historic Buildings Trust. "Manchester is finally realising what an important writer she is. We are confident her house can be saved as a fitting memorial."

Here's hoping!

Categories: Charlotte_Brontë, In_the_News